“Jesus.”
When the word left his mouth, Zak turned and locked eyes with him. Ernie had been too caught up with the nasty shit on the floor to see the boy until they were already looking at each other.
Ernie climbed the last few steps, stood tall, pointed a hard finger at Zak. “You’re dead, boy. Just like your mama.”
And all Zak did was smile.
The smile shook Ernie, sent tremors through his bones. He even backed up a step, but the back of his shoe hit something.
“Hi, Chuck,” Zak said.
“Wha—”
Strong hands seized Ernie’s shoulders, spun him around. He stared into the face of what looked like roadkill. Black fluid spurted from the smashed face, and a tongue snaked out of the mess and spun in the air just before a stream of the black stuff rushed into Ernie’s face and blinded him, sent hot lightning into his sockets that scorched the optic nerves.
Ernie tried to shriek, but when his mouth opened, it was filled with more of the liquid. It rushed down his throat, set his belly on fire.
Then he was being dragged. He clawed at his eyes, hoping to God he wasn’t truly blind.
He almost shouted with joy when a hint of light ignited in his vision, then the room started to come back into focus.
Zak stood over him. The boy’s skin looked different, red, covered in pimples. Ernie didn’t remember Zak ever having acne trouble before.
The living roadkill stood beside Zak, that tongue dancing like a cobra enticed by a snake charmer.
Zak held a bloated, purple corpse by its armpits, and once the boy lowered the corpse’s head toward Ernie’s face, he realized it was the pipsqueak. Zak’s cousin. Recognized him from pictures that Sarah had hung in the living room back home.
What in the fuck is going on around here?
“Welcome to the party, Ernie,” Zak said. “You’re just in time.”
Zak raked his nails across the pipsqueak’s swollen face, rupturing the fat, greasy boils there. Purple and blue and green and pink poured from the opened flesh and coated Ernie’s face, filled his mouth and nostrils and eyes.
And for the briefest of moments, just a flash, Ernie felt fantastic. Like he could fuck every woman in the world.
But that melted away into an inferno of pain and suffering as his flesh bubbled and started slipping off his body.
As Zak smiled down at him, the zits on the boy’s face got to moving.
Pulsating. Throbbing.
And then Ernie’s eyes burst, and he let out a final scream before even that turned to liquid.
Acknowledgements
I tend to always thank the same people. So, everyone who has been thanked before, thanks again! This is my first bizarro book, so I want to thank all of the amazing people I have had the privilege of meeting and spending time with the last two years at BizarroCon. You guys are the shit! And of course, thank you Jeff Burk, Carlton Mellick, and Rose O’Keefe. You guys push me, force me out of my comfort zone, and consistently inspire me. Love you guys. And thanks to my wife Melinda for not divorcing me when I told her my next book was called Pus Junkies.
About the Author
SHANE MCKENZIE is the author of Infinity House, All You Can Eat, Bleed on Me, Jacked, Addicted to the Dead, Muerte Con Carne, Escape from Shit Town (co-authored with Sam W. Anderson and Erik Williams), Fairy, The Bingo Hall, and many more to come. He is also the editor at Sinister Grin Press. He lives in Austin, TX with his wife and daughter. He’s got plenty of pus for everyone, but it’s first come first served. Don’t be greedy.
Copyright
“Pus Junkies” © 2014 Shane McKenzie
Cover Art © 2014 Hauke Vagt
All characters depicted in this book are fictitious, and any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.
No part of this book may be reproduced in whole or in part without the publisher’s written consent, except for the purposes of review.